Ass End of Human Centipede Sues Twitter Because Somebody Called Him That
Occasionally, a news story comes along that is impossible to satirize. Such is the case with Congressman Devin Nunes filing a $250 million dollar lolsuit against Twitter, libertarian strategist Liz Mair, and a couple of internet trolls calling themselves Devin Nunes’ Mom and Devin Nunes’ Cow. The suit alleges that comments posted by these accounts show a pattern of discrimination against conservative users across the platform — namely, that Twitter hides and removes comments supportive of the Republican agenda and allows liberal shitposters to savagely mock elected officials, causing grievous harm and irreparable damage to their self-esteem.
Nunes, of course, is best known for his role as chair of the House Intelligence Committee, an ostensibly apolitical role that insures the integrity of House inquiries into matters of national security, that Nunes used as a conduit to keep the White House informed about developments in the investigation into President Trump’s Russia connections. A regular on Fox News, Nunes can be seen most nights dismissing allegations against the President, promoting conspiracy theories that erode confidence in American intelligence agencies, and trashing the liberal insistence upon a politically correct culture that is ever mindful of their feeeeeelings. Additionally, Representative Nunes is listed as co-sponsor for a stalled piece of legislation called the “Discouraging Frivolous Lawsuits Act.” Sources confirm that you cannot make this shit up.
Legal analysts suggest that Nunes has an uphill climb to prove in a court of law that random memes on the internet are materially detrimental to his character and reputation. Further, they caution, the discovery phase of any legal preceding to follow might be particularly painful for the congressman, considering he must now demonstrate that he is not a shill, racist, or objective piece of shit, as he is often characterized online. But while pessimism about Nunes’ chances of success pervades the legal community, scholars note that there is no established case law for many of the parameters within this lawsuit and they are giddy to find out, for instance, exactly how literally the Supreme Court is willing to construe tweets purportedly written by a cow.
Backlash to the filing and the unending stream of memes it has produced — memes far more dank than the ones mentioned in the suit — has caused some on the right to question whether this filing is the right approach and whether Nunes is the best messenger to represent them in their grievance campaign against social media companies for what they see as anti-conservative bias. Others, however, think the suit is a step in the right direction and away from the previous unsuccessful strategy of mindlessly retweeting the President’s tweets about how powerless they are and threatening to rape anyone they disagree with.
The Nunes filing comes at a particularly pertinent time for conservative social media rights fighters as news broke late Monday that White House social media director, Dan Scavino, had his personal Facebook page temporarily suspended for what the company described as a content-related review. Critics of the social media giant point to this as just the latest example of a disturbing trend towards purging the internet of conservative personalities like Alex Jones, Jacob Wohl and Richard Spencer. Facebook apologized for the mixup, explaining that Scavino’s account had been flagged as a bot when the algorithm determined that his posts were too intellectually dishonest to be written and promoted by a human. Scavino’s access has since been restored and the company addressed the broader controversy in a press release that said: “Wait. You guys are seriously willing to tie yourselves to Jones, Wohl, and Spencer?”
Regardless of what happens with the Nunes lawsuit, questions about the moral and legal responsibility of social media companies to protect users from highly predatory content while preserving free-speech provisions for those who produce only mildly predatory content will no doubt extend long into the election season. For now, it’s enough to say that this is a very serious situation and I expect that Twitter, as a company and as a community, will come together to put the most important issues in the right perspective.
